


i don't want your body

by ToAStranger



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hopeful Ending, Kinda, Kinda kinda, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-07
Updated: 2018-01-07
Packaged: 2019-03-01 12:25:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 971
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13294836
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ToAStranger/pseuds/ToAStranger
Summary: Steve should know better.  But it still hurts.





	i don't want your body

The thing is, Steve thinks he should be over it. He’s graduated. Summer in Hawkins has hit, and sweltering days are around the corner. He’s got a cushy job lined up with his dad’s company at the end of August. He’s got a trip to New York coming in two weeks. He’s got a girl draped against him at the last bash of the school year.

But it still hurts. Seeing Nancy sequestered off in the corner of the backyard with Jonathan, leaned close under the fairy lights strung up outside, laughing as he says something low and just for them in her ear.

It hurts and Steve knows better.

He has to pull his eyes away. Has to down his drink. Has to smile down at Janet or Donna or whoever is hanging against him. He should know her name, thought for a while he was better than this, but he knows he’s not. Knows he never was.

“Harrington!” Tommy calls, grinning ear to ear, from next to the keg by the pool, eyes beady and hard as ever. “Wanna give it a go for old time’s sake?”

And Steve knows he shouldn’t. It’s right on the tip of his tongue, the _no_ , but then Billy Hargrove is there, fresh off the keg, grinning and shirtless and daring.

“Sure,” Steve says, because he’s become increasingly fond of bad ideas since autumn.

Tommy blinks, shocked, but Steve is already shrugging away from Kelly or Jamie or whoever this junior is and making his way over and pulling his keys and wallet out of his pockets. He shoves them against Tommy’s chest and rolls his shoulders.

“Spot me?” He asks, and Billy is watching him, all blue eyes and sharp teeth.

“Sure thing.”

Keg stands, as a rule, are dizzying. The blood rushes to his head, pounds behind his eyes and at his temples as he tips up and over, Billy Hargrove’s hands bracing his shins, and someone is offering up the tube and Steve is drinking, drinking, drinking –

Until he can’t anymore. Until he’s tipping back over onto his feet and coughing and there are cheers ringing in his ears as Billy grips his wrist and hoists it to the sky.

“King Steve!” He crows, after Steve has officially swiped the title back, and when Steve looks at him, spots swimming in his vision, Billy looks wild and bright and beautiful and Steve can’t help but smile. “Somebody get this man a shot!”

Steve’s dazed. A bit wobbly. But he downs whatever is shoved into his hands anyways, watches Billy snatch up his wallet and keys from Tommy’s dumb, numb hands, and looks – like he always does – over his shoulder at Nancy.

She’s got that frown on her face. That worried pinch of her brow. Jonathan, too.

Steve turns away, blinks as Billy tugs him forward by the shirt front and tucks his keys back into his pocket for him. There’s a hint of tongue and Steve just wants to forget about Nancy’s big eyes.

“Congrats, Harrington.” Billy says.

“You got any cigarettes?” Steve asks.

Billy’s brows fly up. “Sure. C'mon, Keg King.”

He drapes his arm around Steve’s shoulders, sweaty and smelling like beer. Steve stumbles after him as Billy leads him, like returned royalty, through the house, past the kitchen, down the hall, and into the bathroom at the back.

He shoves Steve in, shoves the door behind him after he follows, and shoves Steve back against the sink.

“Wheeler got your panties in a bunch again, pretty boy?”

Steve grits his teeth; they’ve done this song and dance. “Shut up and kiss me until I forget.”

Billy grins, all teeth, and obliges.

It’s heavy and heady and messy. Billy always pushes too hard, like he’s trying to crawl into Steve’s skin, and uses too much tongue until Steve feels like he can’t breathe.

What they have isn’t sweet or kind. It’s rough and right and just what Steve needs – to remind himself to feel something besides numb or dull or dead. It started sometime in March, after the championship games, after winning and getting too drunk at an after party. After Nancy had kissed his cheek in congratulations and Steve had needed to drown himself in something real. In something he could have.

It hasn’t stopped since.

“When are you gonna learn, pretty boy?” Billy asks against his throat, teeth pressed to his pulse like he might rip it out, his hands down the back of Steve’s pants, groping at flesh and tugging Steve’s hips against his own. “She’s not for you. That’s not for you. You just got this. Me.”

Steve moans, bucks, claws at Billy’s back.

“Don’t belong with her. Can’t have her. She’s got somebody else.” Billy hisses, and Steve knows it, feels it ring true, feels it rattle something loose in him until he’s on the edge – of bliss, of tears, of oblivion. “Plant your feet, Harrington. Get your head outta the clouds.”

Steve comes with Billy’s name on his tongue.

When they’re done and cleaned up, Billy lights a cigarette and passes it to him. Steve takes it, hands shaking, and drags deep.

Billy stares at Steve, regards him through the smoke, and leans in to kiss it from his lips.

“Can’t give you much, Harrington.” Billy says, gripping Steve by the jaw, staring him down, keeping him close, keeping them intertwined in the only way two broken boys know how. “But I can give you more than her. I can give you this.”

Steve thinks of Nancy. Of Nancy and Jonathan. And he should know better. But it still hurts.

“Yeah,” he says, curls his fingers around Billy’s hips, and knows it won’t ever last, won’t ever be more than this, but this might be exactly what he needs. “Yeah, I know.”


End file.
